Dinosaurs in the Nursery

Our church has a team heavily involved in a church revitalization program called, "Connected in Christ."  I have talked about the ministry enough that it may be familiar to some of you who read this post, but if not, let me briefly explain.

Connected in Christ provides the space, tools, and mentoring to help churches grow spiritually--with depth and in numbers.   It asks churches to look at themselves honestly, decide who God is calling them to be, and then fearlessly tackle the obstacles holding them back, be it a lack of hospitality, clarity of mission, poor worship, self-centeredness, and other distortions of authentic church.

During a recent brain-storming session of our CIC team leaders, a new member of our church, John Owens, made an interesting observation.  We were discussing the characteristics of QQUMC that set us apart from other churches. What makes us unique, and thus attractive to those beyond our walls?  

One characteristic we all agreed on was the intellectual curiosity of our guests and members. We said things like, Our church is a thinking church.   We take the Bible seriously, but not literally.  Quapaw Quarter has an intellectual openness.  We do not see the world in extremes of black and white, but rather gray.  It is good to ask questions, for in questions, one finds a sense of humility: we do not have all the answers.  

John, who recently volunteered to help out once-a-month in our nursery, commented that he'd never seen dinosaur toys in a church nursery.   We all stopped a moment, then laughed!  What John was suggesting is that our church members must believe in evolution and not see it in contradiction to the biblical witness or the power of truth in the Genesis creation narrative, the truth of who we humans are created to be.  Most of us seem to assume that faith and science can walk hand-in-hand.  This perspective means there is a place between secularism and fundamentalism.   To put it another way, we can embrace the languages of science and culture without giving in to secularism (see "Christianity for the Rest of Us," by Diana Butler Bass).

My little boy loves extinct dinosaurs and his church family.  He has books about dinosaurs, and he has books about baby Jesus.   He has dinosaur toys, and he has Noah's ark.   Two of his first words were:  "Jesus" (it sounded like "shee-us"), and "amen" (it sounded like Ahhhh-men). I didn't even know he could say "amen," but he blurted it out one day in church sitting next to his Aunt Gayle after the Lord's Prayer.  

I'd like to hear your thoughts about being a church that is unafraid to think.

Peace,

Rev. Betsy